posted by Jessica Lynette on Finances

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I still marvel at the timing of everything.
And God providing for our every need.

Moving to Georgia was like a fresh start for us financially.
We were suddenly making real money.
But while we were saving we were also spending it.

All of a sudden I could buy whatever I wanted at the grocery store because our bank account was full.
We bought a new-to-us car with a hefty down payment, but not in full, which meant monthly payments.
We bought electronics, dishes, new bedding – all sorts of fun and entirely unnecessary things.

Somewhere in that first year of making real money we realized this isn’t what we want. We didn’t want to make money just to spend it. We had lived on so little once, we knew we could live on much less than what we were currently living on. We wanted to put a name to our money and make our money do exactly what we wanted. Certainly there is room for fun, gadgets, vacations, etc. but those things weren’t our goals.

So we regrouped and refocused.  We set goals. We made plans to meet the goals. And in meeting set goals we were encouraged to set higher goals.

Our first big goal was to pay cash for the honeymoon we had never had.

Next we tackled our remaining debt which came from our car and Paul’s schooling years ago.
After paying off our debt the ‘fun’ goals started, some of them including – a down payment on our house, hardwood flooring (that Paul installed himself) and, most recently, three tickets for the boys and myself to fly to Nigeria in November.

The fun goals might be normal purchases for some, but to us they were exciting and a huge deal. They are the results of goals we laid out for ourselves and the efforts we put into implementing our plans to reach those goals.

But the fun goals weren’t the only goals we had. We grew our emergency fund. And then Paul had this crazy idea to save a relatively large portion of his pay check last year, and an even larger amount this year.

And again, I am amazed at God’s timing and the vision He gave Paul to save so much.
Because as of this coming  November – 4 years after we moved down here – Paul will, once again, be unemployed.
And in January he will be going back to school full time – but this time, thanks to the military benefits and our savings we should be able to make it through the next three years debt free and, while we certainly need to be wise with our finances, things should be relatively stress free too.

Tags: Army, money